How can I get this company completely in the cloud?

F

Forealz

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 7, 2007
Messages
253
Hi
I've taken over IT for a jewelry company in town and I've been trying to get my new clients completely into a cloud solution like Office 365. I've been dealing mainly in small business and my goal has been getting the server off premises.

The problem is they use a jewelry database program called Edge. Right now its installed on a computer then shared on a homegroup with all the other computers in the office. They have no server. I know the easy solution is to load them up with a sbs 2011 server and put it on there (I'm going to upgrade and replace most of their computers in the next few months) but like I said earlier I've been trying to get away from on premise servers for small business. How would you guys proceed?
 
A quick look on the vendor's website shows they aren't doing much with an online-based version. I would just get them a proper in-house system with secure backups. Sometimes you just need to use the right tool for the job.
 
what about putting the server at a colo and then buy them a vpn router.. ?
 
There's also AWS/EC2 potentially combined with Remote Desktop Services - App Streaming.
 
Dash good point I thought about that after I posted.

I can't make heads or tails of AWS Windows options.. unless I'm looking in the wrong place. (Which I sure I am.)
 
adam30k said:
Dash good point I thought about that after I posted.

I can't make heads or tails of AWS Windows options.. unless I'm looking in the wrong place. (Which I sure I am.)
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well if yuo co lo it, you cold probably build a cheap little computer run the os on it, and then do a vpn tunnel to their office.


If you do this, you would want to design some backup system or something,

I know some colo's that give you a ip address or a ethernet cable to your server that you could install your own firewall into, then be able to manage the server and client side too..
 
Co-lo or hosted/managed Remote Desktop Services server (previously known as Terminal Server). They can connect via hosted apps or RDP.
 
http://www.dincloud.com/

Problem solved. All licensing taken care of, latest Windows Server OS/Exchange/Office suite included as part of the service, redundancies and all networking taken care of, no need to worry about another customer interfering with your bandwidth (you are guaranteed your bandwidth), Amazon-style cloud (the only limit is your own connection between your computer and the internet), all backups taken care of, scale up and down as rapidly as you desire on-demand (and without having to deal with licensing issues).

They are the only company amidst all the companies out there (HP, Dell, Lenovo, etc) who Microsoft is providing an extremely special licensing scheme that allows for rapid scaling and descaling, etcetera and other situations that are otherwise impossible/very costly -- without being costly (to them or to you).

EDIT: Also, you are not paying for fixed hardware limits. As part of the service, you get as much resources as you need (CPU, HDD, diskspace, etc) and it will scale up and down on-demand and on-the-go.
 
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I'd suggest try using Rackspace...

http://www.rackspace.com/

You basically "Lease" a server from them. User's will use RDP to access the server.

It's straightforward and simple. We have a skin surgery Center that uses it.
 
Just be weary about Rackspace usage of 'cloud'. When Rackspace mentions 'cloud', they are really just meaning a cluster of servers in one DC, which is not the standard and globally accepted definition of cloud. Amazon Cloud = good example of a cloud, where it is clusters of servers synchronized across multiple DCs globally around the world.

Rackspace could work for OPs situation though.
 
None of the cloud based virtual PCs will have quite the same responsiveness of a real local machine.

One of my customers tried it and was quite unhappy.

Furthermore, remember you're trading one set of problems for another. You still have the same level of user-based errors, but now any changes to the system you might want to make (group policy, etc...) are up to a 3rd party.
 
jjeff1 said:
None of the cloud based virtual PCs will have quite the same responsiveness of a real local machine.

One of my customers tried it and was quite unhappy.

Furthermore, remember you're trading one set of problems for another. You still have the same level of user-based errors, but now any changes to the system you might want to make (group policy, etc...) are up to a 3rd party.
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Rackspace will still give you administrator access to the server you are purchasing. If anything, you can RDP from anywhere using a regular windows or mac machine.
 
Go with a colo solution if you really want to be in the "cloud". Though personally I'd stick to in house. Especially for small businesses that may only have a simple business DSL/cable and not redundant links or at least a single high availability link like a T1. Even a T1 can go down though, but it's usually considered a higher priority to fix it than DSL/cable.

If their internet goes down and all their stuff is in the cloud, they are dead in the water, and guess who they'll be going after with torch and pitchforks when their new solution stopped working because their internet is out?

What you could do is have it in house but have it backed up in the cloud.
 
Red Squirrel said:
Go with a colo solution if you really want to be in the "cloud". Though personally I'd stick to in house. Especially for small businesses that may only have a simple business DSL/cable and not redundant links or at least a single high availability link like a T1. Even a T1 can go down though, but it's usually considered a higher priority to fix it than DSL/cable.

If their internet goes down and all their stuff is in the cloud, they are dead in the water, and guess who they'll be going after with torch and pitchforks when their new solution stopped working because their internet is out?

What you could do is have it in house but have it backed up in the cloud.
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This is a great solution :)


I guess it would also depend on if the piece of software is the POS part of the business or just an inventory ETC ETC..
 
"You might be eager to relinquish responsibility of a cranky infrastructure component and push the headaches to a cloud vendor, but in reality you aren't doing that at all. Instead, you're adding another avenue for the blame to follow. The end result of a catastrophic failure or data loss event is exactly the same whether you own the service or contract it out. The difference is you can't do anything about it directly."

Adopt The Cloud, Kill Your IT Career
 
aronesz said:
Just be weary about Rackspace usage of 'cloud'. When Rackspace mentions 'cloud', they are really just meaning a cluster of servers in one DC, which is not the standard and globally accepted definition of cloud. Amazon Cloud = good example of a cloud, where it is clusters of servers synchronized across multiple DCs globally around the world.

Rackspace could work for OPs situation though.
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amazon doesnt sync your shit across DCs unless you pay for it.
 
I'm curious - if the customer is happy and their existing solution is working out great for them... then why fix something that isn't broken? Why increase expense, risk, and change the entire way that they have been doing things simply so it can be a sales pitch of cloud architecture? It would be a another story if their existing solution has issues...
 
To Ockie: The current solution is working, but its a bit sloppy. Right now they have the software installed on a desktop then mapped on a network drive to the other computers that need it in a home group. They are due for an upgrade and I could get them a sbs box, but I've been trying to find solutions that remove sbs boxes from small businesses.

To Evilsofa: Why everything in the cloud? Why not have something in house? Yes that would work and is the obvious answer but I've generally been looking for alternate solutions in the cloud. Solutions that I can sell or resell and run themselves. It gives me peace of mind to spend my time searching for new clients to help rather than being support, which I dislike, and customers typically appreciate fixed expenses. Also, I like relocating points of failure offsite, even though if something does fail I get a ton of billable hours it is very stressful and I generally don't have time to deal with unexpected things.
 
Forealz said:
To Ockie: The current solution is working, but its a bit sloppy. Right now they have the software installed on a desktop then mapped on a network drive to the other computers that need it in a home group. They are due for an upgrade and I could get them a sbs box, but I've been trying to find solutions that remove sbs boxes from small businesses.

To Evilsofa: Why everything in the cloud? Why not have something in house? Yes that would work and is the obvious answer but I've generally been looking for alternate solutions in the cloud. Solutions that I can sell or resell and run themselves. It gives me peace of mind to spend my time searching for new clients to help rather than being support, which I dislike, and customers typically appreciate fixed expenses. Also, I like relocating points of failure offsite, even though if something does fail I get a ton of billable hours it is very stressful and I generally don't have time to deal with unexpected things.
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Like others said, I don't think the risk is worth the change. Moving everything to the cloud make their internet the single point of failure. And I have seen the internet go down far more than any servers ever do. Even though it won't be your fault, they will blame you for the loss of work/money. So unless it is a large company with redundant WANs with SLAs, there is no way I would EVER move them 100% to the cloud.
 
Forealz said:
To Ockie: The current solution is working, but its a bit sloppy. Right now they have the software installed on a desktop then mapped on a network drive to the other computers that need it in a home group. They are due for an upgrade and I could get them a sbs box, but I've been trying to find solutions that remove sbs boxes from small businesses.

To Evilsofa: Why everything in the cloud? Why not have something in house? Yes that would work and is the obvious answer but I've generally been looking for alternate solutions in the cloud. Solutions that I can sell or resell and run themselves. It gives me peace of mind to spend my time searching for new clients to help rather than being support, which I dislike, and customers typically appreciate fixed expenses. Also, I like relocating points of failure offsite, even though if something does fail I get a ton of billable hours it is very stressful and I generally don't have time to deal with unexpected things.
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As Biznatch hinted at; pushing stuff offsite ( I refuse to use the marketing BS "cloud", sorry ) doesn't make it NOT your responsibility. It just limits what access you have to it when things go sideways. You go from being the one in control who can fix things, to being a highly paid support monkey waiting on hold. When things break, however, you are still responsible for it.

You have to evaluate each service to determine it's off-site feasibility. Essentially, look at the guaranteed turn around time each service provides, double it, and then determine if the company would comfortably last through such an outage.

Another thing to consider about offsite services; the functionality you can offer the end client is limited to what the upstream vendor can provide. The trade off is not often to your advantage.
 
aronesz said:
As long as you avoid $100 servers on eBay, refurbished & used hardware, and have a proper Windows AD/GP setup. :D
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but i want a full fetched legit server for 500$ and i want it to last 10 years.

YEAH i actual heard that once.

The other one I heard was,

Can't I just use our acer tower and put server os on that that I downloaded and that can be our server......
 
cyr0n_k0r said:
Oh my bad, I forgot about the Dell ∞ Server. They are running a deal on it right now for $99.99
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Please tell me it has 10 year 0% financing so I can get in for 10. :D
 
Forealz said:
It gives me peace of mind to spend my time searching for new clients to help rather than being support
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Get your terminology straight. You are not helping your customers. You are screwing them.

The remainder of this thread is being spent giving you your definition of "help". Enjoy!
 
The main thing about the edge is each machine has a config file that points to an access database.

It really is a shit software and short of adding extra break points and monthly cost a local install really is best for the edge software.

I've switched a client from some old software to the edge and pointing it to a local mapped drive is the simplist thing you'll get.

Also the updates for edge are weird, you have to shutdown the main "server" log on one by one and update or something... It's late and I can't think of the actual process but the edge is stupid.
 
f1y said:
The main thing about the edge is each machine has a config file that points to an access database.

It really is a shit software and short of adding extra break points and monthly cost a local install really is best for the edge software.

I've switched a client from some old software to the edge and pointing it to a local mapped drive is the simplist thing you'll get.

Also the updates for edge are weird, you have to shutdown the main "server" log on one by one and update or something... It's late and I can't think of the actual process but the edge is stupid.
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Reminds me of some medical software we had when I worked at the hospital. It's crazy how some of the most expensive and specialized apps can be so crappy in the way they work. Access database = ewww.
 
Red Squirrel said:
Reminds me of some medical software we had when I worked at the hospital. It's crazy how some of the most expensive and specialized apps can be so crappy in the way they work. Access database = ewww.
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Yeah... They paid quite a bit for this and then I called and asked about permissions and then saw the .mdb file or whatever the access db is called and was like "OH MY GOD"

Whatever...
 
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